Ms-10 Question bank (12)
Ms-10 Question bank
Ms-10 Dec 2009
Written by sales@mbaonlinepapers.com sales@mbaonlinepapers.comMS-10 Dec, 2009
MS-10 : ORGANISATIONAL DESIGN, DEVELOPMENT AND CHANGE
1. Describe recent trends in work organisations and their effect on employees.
2. Discuss the factors affecting organisational design and their relevance with suitable examples.
3. Describe any two OD interventions and their advantages.
4. Describe and explain the importance of interview as a diagnostic tool.
5. Write short notes on any three of the following :
a) Competencies of change agents
b) Job Rotation and Job Enrichment
c) Inverted Pyramid
d) Work shop Methodology as a diagnostic tool
(e) Managing Resistance to change
6. Read the following case carefully and answer the questions given at the end.
The middle managers of a large firm were told by the corporate human resources office that a group of consultants would be calling on them later in the week. The purpose of the consultants' visit would be to analyze interfunctional relations throughout the firm. The consultants had been very effective in using an OD intervention called team building. Their particular approach used six steps. When their approach was explained to the managers, a great deal of tension was relieved.
They had initially thought that team building was a lot of hocus-pocus, like sensitivity training, where people attack each other and let out their aggressions by heaping abuse on those they dislike. By the same token, these managers generally felt that perhaps the consultants were not needed. One of them put it this way : "Now that we understand what is involved in team building, we can go ahead and conduct the sessions ourselves. All we have to do is to choose a manager who is liked by everyone and put him or her in the role of the change agent/consultant. After all, you really don't need a high priced consultant to do this team-building stuff. You just have to have a good feel for human nature." The
other managers generally agreed. However, the corporate human resources director turned down their suggestion. He hired the OD consultants to do the team building.
Questions :
a) Bring out the main features of this case.
b) What is a team building approach to organization development ? Do you think the managers had an accurate view of this OD technique ?
c) Do you think that the managers had an accurate view of the role of external consultants ?
d) What will be your plan of action in the situation ?
Ms-10 Dec 2010
Written by sales@mbaonlinepapers.com sales@mbaonlinepapers.comMS-10 Dec, 2010
MS-10 : ORGANISATIONAL DESIGN, DEVELOPMENT AND CHANGE
Ms-10 Dec 2011
Written by sales@mbaonlinepapers.com sales@mbaonlinepapers.com
MS-10 Dec, 2011
MS-10 : ORGANISATIONAL DESIGN, DEVELOPMENT AND CHANGE
1. Discuss the meaning and characteristics of an organisation. Briefly discuss various approaches to understanding organisations.
2. Describe the evolutionary process of organisational design. Briefly discuss the contingency model of organisation design, with suitable example.
3. Define and discuss the elements of designing a job. Briefly describe the impact of technology on Job Design. Explain with suitable examples.
4. Define Organisational Development and briefly describe various stages of Organisational Development, with suitable examples.
5. Write short notes on any three of the following :
(a) Impact of information Technology on organising work
(b) Quality of work life
(c) Methods of Organisational Analysis
(d) Survey Feedback
(e) Resistance to change.
6. Please read the case and answer the questions given at the end.
Tidewater Manufacturing Company is a medium-size producer of machine gaskets operating in the south - eastern part of Bombay. Until about two years ago, the company's financial outlook was very strong. Recently, however, it has been facing much stiffer competition from foreign producers and a variety of internal problems have also begun to surface.
Top management believes that they know how to deal with the external issues. But nothing they do will be successful -until the existing problems with employees have been addressed. Unfortunately, there is no clear consensus among the top management about the real nature or extent of employee concerns. Tandon, the firm's President, has decided that a management committee should be formed to look into the increasing absenteeism and turnover rates, grievances, and generally weak morale. Turnover, for example, has been running at a rate of 72 per cent for the past year, grievances are up by about 25 per cent, and two recent attitude surveys showed that in some departments employee morale is, in fact, down. Tandon considers the firm to be an enlightened employer that cares about its employees. The committee he has appointed includes himself, Rajesh, Head of Marketing, Umesh, Plant Manager in-charge of production, and Deepak, Personnel Director. The committee is now meeting in formal session.
Tandon : I appreciate your taking time to be here today. As you know, several employee-related issues have been slowing us down of late, and given the stiff competition we are getting, I believe it is high time we find out what is going on. Rajesh, how about if you lead off ?
Rajesh : As I see it, we have not been able to make the production changes we talked about last year because of all this hassling with employees. I have been giving the problem some thought and I believe that we need to light a fire under those people down the line. My sales people are out there beating the bushes, but they cannot sell a product that just does not measure up. Last week, one of my people lost a major sale to that new West German firm.
Umesh : I agree with some of what you are saying Rajesh, but I would not lay all the blame on the production crew. After all, we have been losing a lot of good people lately and it takes time to train the new hands. Besides that, I cannot seem to get anybody to come to work on Friday. If I make any moves, the union representative hits me with a pile of grievances for unnecessary harassment. If you have some answers, I am sure we can make the modifications you were just talking about.
Tandon : I guess we know where you two stand, but I would still like another opinion. Deepak, how do you see things ?
Deepak : My reaction is that we probably cannot deal with issues internally. I would suggest that we bring someone in from the outside to diagnose the situation. 1 have been doing some study and I think that some of the problems of turnover and absenteeism plus the poor showing in the recent attitude survey my office administered, might be due to discontent with our production line approach. Some of those people have been doing the same thing, day in and day out, for years. They are probably bored stiff. Maybe it is time for us to consider something like job redesign.
Tandon : Okay, but all I remember about job redesign was something about job enrichment ten years ago in one of my MBA courses. Frankly, I have not kept up and I would not even know where to begin.
Rajesh : Would we not be better off if we just started a new incentive programme ?
Umesh : Incentives could work, but I would like to follow up on Deepak's idea. By the way where does the union fit into all of this ?
Deepak : Let me do some checking and see if I can get a line on a good consultant. It should take me about ten days to put together the information we need.
Tandon : Well, let us leave it at that and plan to meet again a week from Thursday. At that point , the meeting adjourned with the understanding that the firm would consider some form of job redesign.
Questions :
(a) You are a consultant called into this situation. How would you proceed ? Would job redesign be of use here and, if so, how ?
(b) What alternative approaches to job redesign might this firm consider, i.e., would job
enlargement be better than job enrichment, would a team concept be appropriate ?
(c) Should the top management involve the union at this stage ? What should it tell the employees ?
